opus perfectum est et sic con/stat ex suis partibus ut nichil infra sit quod non sit necessarium/ nec aliquid excrescat quod non sit su/perfluum. In primis praemittit quasi quedam ludicra quedam ficticia quedam leuiora ut quodam modo assuefaciant animum audito/ris ad suscipienda graviora
[Plato] uses the form of a dialogue and he inserts the number six so that the work will represent perfection, for just as this number is perfect and is made up of its parts, so this work is perfect and is made up of its parts, so that there is nothing below that is not necessary nor does he remove anything that is not superfluous. First of all, he sets things out, as if they were jokes, or a fiction, or something casually amusing, as if in a certain way they were to prepare the mind of his listener to take up heavier matters.
Figure 4. MS Bodleian Digby 23(1), fol. 4V (with permission of the Bodleian Library).
Why one, two, three, and four should make up six, or why six should be considered perfect may not be immediately apparent. Here the glosses of Bernard are helpful: “Socrates … requirit unum quem sentit abesse, non forsitan realiter, sed sub significatione. Nam subtracto quarto, remanent partes quae coniunctae faciunt primum perfectum numerum, id est sex, et ideo a perfecto incipit” (Socrates … asks after one whom he feels is missing, not perhaps realistically, but under a deeper meaning. For if you take away four, the parts that remain together make the first perfect number, that is, six, and therefore the work starts from a perfect number).108 In other words, if, having removed four, we add one plus two plus three, we get six, which is a perfect number because it combines the first three prime numbers. It is because the gloss is so succinct that it is slightly cryptic. It assumes familiarity with a tradition of mathematical commentary and would make sense to another master who was equally familiar both with the text and with certain approaches to its interpretation.
One of the most striking contributions of the pothook glossator comes on folio 5r. The gloss begins “Socrates tracturus de positiva iusticia. non inuenit regnum nec rem publicam aliquam dispositiam secundum rationem/ positive iusticie. Proposuit ergo rem publicam/ quamdam et eam ordinauit secundum dispositionem quam considerauerat in macroscosmo et microcos/mo” (Socrates, when he was going to discuss positive justice, did not see any state ordered according to the logic of positive justice, and therefore proposed a certain [hypothetical] state and arranged it according to a certain plan which he considered in light of the macrocosm and the microcosm, fig. 5).109 The remainder of the gloss, which has been transcribed and translated by Dutton, compares three hierarchies: that of the macrocosm, from God to devils; that within man himself, from wisdom, located in the head, down through the heart to the feet and hands; and that in the state, from the senators, down through the soldiers, to those working in the mechanical arts such as skinners, cobblers, tanners, and farmers, who are outside the city. Dutton has argued persuasively that this gloss draws heavily either on the glosses of William of Conches or on glosses that are very similar to them.110 As Dutton notes, the Digby glossator’s account differs in a few details. The glossator includes farmers among those men living outside the city walls, for example, whereas William makes no mention of them.111 The most striking difference, however, is that William does not explicitly use the terms “microcosm” or “macrocosm.” Since the pothook glossator follows William so closely in other respects, it is tempting to think that this innovation may be his own. We may never know who this Digby glossator was, who his teachers were, or even where he taught, because at this stage the manuscript might still have been on the Continent. He remains for the moment an anonymous but judicious reader. Whoever he was, his gloss touches the very heart of the anthropological implication of the Timaeus that “man is himself a universe” and that cosmic order is reflected in human life.112
Figure 5. MS Bodleian Digby 23(1), fo. 5r (with permission of the Bodleian Library).
One of the central concerns for the masters commenting on the Timaeus was its use of myth, a problem that the reader first encounters when Critias begins his account of what his grandfather, Critias the elder, heard from Solon about Atlantis. While in Egypt, Solon discussed the earliest times with the priests, and told them how Deucalion and Pyrrha survived the flood. But the priests were not impressed, and one said, “O Solo, Graeci pueri semper estis nec quisquam e graecia senex” (O Solon, you Greeks are all children and none of you is old, fol. IIV).113 Then the priest went on to explain that the Greek story of Phaethon, the child of the sun, who harnessed his father’s chariot and then burned the earth when he could not control it, insisting that “fabulosa quidem putatur, sed est vera” (it is considered by some to be a fable, but is true). The priest explains that the story refers to long-term variations in the climate that produce floods or droughts. It is a passage carefully noted by William of Conches as an integumentum with a moral truth:
Huius rei talis est veritas. Pheton interpretatur ardor. Qui filius solis esse dictur quia ex sole calor procedit. Qui filius Climenes esse dicitur id est humoris quia sine humore fervor esse non potest. Hic currus solis ducit. Sol dicitur habere currum propter circuitionem circa terram. Hunc quatuor equi trahunt quia quatuor sunt diei proprietates: in mane enim rubet, deinde splendet, postea calet, ad ultimum descendit et tepet. Quibus nomina equorum conveniunt. Primus enim dicitur Eritheus id est rubens, secundus Acteon id est splendens, tercius Lampos id est ardens, quartus Philogeus id est amans terram.114
The truth of this matter is as follows. Phaethon means heat, and he is said to be the son of the sun since heat comes from the sun. He is said to be the son of Climene, that is, of moisture, since without moisture there can be no heat. Phaethon guides the chariot of the sun. The sun is said to have a chariot because it goes around the earth. Four horses draw this chariot since the day has four properties: it is red in the morning, then it shines brightly, then it provides clear light, and then at the last it fades. The names of the four horses match these four stages: the first is called Eritheus, that is, ruddy; the second Acteon, that is, shining; the third Lampos, that is burning, and the fourth Philogeus, that is, loving the land.
On folio 12r, the pothook glossator offers a long gloss on this passage, and as far as I am able to read it, he echoes William point for point, as he describes the etymology of the four horses of the sun and the four climatic zones they govern.
The priest then tells Solon that before the great flood Athens excelled all others in her morals and valor. Solon begs to hear more, and the priest says he is happy to continue, chiefly because of his gratitude to that goddess (Pallas Athena) who has founded and supported both states, Athens and, eight thousand years later, Egypt. She founded Athens first, “annis fere mille, ex indigete agro et uulcanio semine” (almost a thousand years after the time of the god-born or god-bearing field and seed of Vulcan, fol. 13V). Well versed in Greek mythology, the twelfth-century commentators recognized the deeper significance that lies behind the flowery but apparently innocuous reference to the date Athens was founded, for Vulcan spills his seed on the field when he attempts to rape Venus, and this gives birth to Ericthonius. The field, or the man from it, is “a diis genito” (from the gods born) as one of the later glossators helpfully explains in a supplementary gloss in the right margin. Here, too, Bernard provides the basic information,115 while William delves deeper:
Legitur in fabulis Vulcanum se Palladi voluisse commiscere. Qua repugnante, cecidit semen in terram ex quo natus est Erictonius habens draguntinos pedes. Unde ad celandam turpitudinem pedum usum curruum invenit.… Huius integumenti talis est veritas. Vulcanus aliquando dicitur ignis, et tunc dicitur vulcanus quasi volicanus id est volans candor quia volat in altum et canus est per favillas …. Hic Palladi se commiscere desiderat quando ex fervore ingenii aliquis perfecte sapientie aspirat. Sed Pallas reluctatur quia